Reach Across the Galaxy
by Felis
Summary: It's slash and there is a MAJOR SPOILER for OoP. Grief after the death of a loved one.


Title: Reach Across the Galaxy  
  
Disclaimer: Characters are owned by JKRowling, although she needs to be more careful with her toys. They break if you don't treat them right.  
  
Notes: If you haven't read the book, you won't understand some of the references. But, even so, knowing the event that is making us all miserable, you'll get the general drift.  
  
.  
  
I'll remember you too clearly  
  
But I'll survive another day  
  
Conversations to share  
  
When there's no one there  
  
I'll imagine what you'd say  
  
I'll see you in another life now, baby  
  
I'll free you in my dreams  
  
But when I reach across the galaxy  
  
I will miss your company  
  
Company  
  
I'll be looking for company  
  
Look and listen  
  
Through the years  
  
Someday you may hear me  
  
Still crying for company  
  
Rickie Lee Jones - "Company"  
  
I walk through the days, presenting an impassive façade to the world. Inside I veer abruptly from numbed shock into white-hot fury. I'm operating on instinct, falling back on habit. I answer questions, make conversation, contribute to our plans, take my shifts, read and write reports, analyze data and news. And I try to ignore the ice that slowly rips my heart to tatters. I try to muzzle the hidden sound of my own screaming, keeping it locked my brain. Because if it ever got out, I don't think I'd ever stop.  
  
People tiptoe around me, not sure what to do or what to say. Mumbled condolences come from some or embarrassed pats to my shoulder. Tonks can barely look at me without crying. Dung sniffles into a grotty, old handkerchief. Molly tries the hardest to say the right words. I give her no expression. Oh, yes, she's sorry about what happened, but she saw you as a rival for Harry's affections. She was blind to what you had suffered through the years and I can't forgive her for that.  
  
You are gone. I still can't believe it. Can't get my mind around it. I expect to hear your footsteps thundering down the stairs when you know I've arrived back here. Back at this house. I can't call it home, though any place where you are.were.was home to me.  
  
But, this place.This evil, festering tomb. How I hate it! How I hate that it ensnared you once again. And Dumbledore insisted that you should stay locked inside for your own safety? That was a fucking great plan. STUPID, OLD MAN!  
  
I've hated it for years, ever since you told me what it was like living here. With them. I won't call them your family, because they never saw you as anything other than a useless, dirty traitor to your bloodlines, heaping scorn and derision on you from such an early age.  
  
A more timid soul would have buckled under the strain. But, you, my star, you fought back with a tenacious courage. You seized your chances when you found them, determined to go your own way rather than be ruled by others who would force you to change your very nature. It's no wonder you were wild and rash and impetuous.  
  
How did this happen? You, who were so skilled with a wand, so inventive in your dueling, how did YOU LET THIS HAPPEN? DAMN YOU! WHY HAVE YOU LFET ME AGAIN?  
  
Why didn't I insist that you stay behind? Why didn't I force you? Body- bind you? Why did I let you persuade me, again, to let you follow a foolhardy course? WHY DIDN'T YOU LISTEN TO ME?  
  
Your very nature killed you. No.that's not fair. It led you into danger, as it has in the past. Danger that you faced without fear, because you were trying to protect someone you loved. How could I not let you help, when it was Harry who was in peril, and you so longed, so needed, to be there for him?  
  
Yes, you are wild and rash and impetuous and brave beyond measure. And the loss of that spirit will echo through all the years of my life.  
  
I listen to Moody talk about Harry. How we must meet him at King's Cross station and talk to his aunt and uncle. Make sure everyone knows that we will be checking on him. All nice and professional and polite. When all I really want to do is find someone responsible, someone to blame, and rip them to pieces. Voldemort, Wormtail, Dumbledore. It hardly matters. They all still breathe, while you.You are gone. And it hurts so much.  
  
We head to the station. Among the crowd of parents I see ahead of us a tall man with long, black hair. Wild, fierce joy surges through me. It was all a mistake! You survived! Somehow, some way! I draw breath to scream your name.And the man turns and he is a stranger. I choke on my jubilant exhalation and it turns to bile at the back of my throat, making me retch.  
  
I look in Harry's eyes. I don't know what to say to him, other than to focus on the business at hand. His eyes look old. He has seen and learned too much. Should he have been told everything sooner? Would he have understood? Would it have been too much for him? Would it have saved you? Right now, God forgive me, I would trade his life for yours. I would throw trainloads of people to the devil, to Voldemort's worst tortures, to bring you back.  
  
That would anger you, though, wouldn't it? I can see the outrage in your eyes, should I be allowed by some higher power to make those unholy bargains. I don't care. Even if all you could give me was your fury, even if you never forgave me, I would do it. Just to know that you walked and breathed and LIVED.it would be a bargain well worth making.  
  
I thought nothing could hurt me more than the aftermath of the Potters' deaths, when I lost all of my pack. I was so wrong. You were locked up forever and I knew you'd never come back. But, you did. Against astronomical odds, you did. But, our time together was so short. So short.  
  
OH, GOD, SIRIUS, COME BACK NOW!  
  
Harry is on his way back to the Dursleys. I'll follow shortly to take my turn on watch at Arabella's house. At least I won't have to go back to Headquarters for a while. I'd rather sleep in the street than stay in that house, where I'm constantly reminded of how miserable it made you.. Then and now. Boy and man. I don't want to see our room or the bed we shared. I don't want to sense your lingering presence, just around the corner, where, no matter how fast I move, I'll never catch up with you.  
  
Not in this lifetime, anyway.  
  
I rage at the utter unfairness of it all. WHY? Why did life force its prisons around you? The invisible, cold barriers of a loveless family. And the icy granite walls of Azkaban. You have been betrayed so many times. By your family. By your society, which condemned you unheard. By your fellow Order members who knew you, worked with you, counted you as a friend. And turned their backs on you when you stood alone and accused. By me, your lover, even though in the depths of my heart I couldn't accept your guilt.  
  
Arabella goes out for cat food. It's a relief not to try to conduct a conversation with her. I sit in her living room and let my mind wander. What would you have said to Harry when he got off the train? I find myself hearing your voice. Not the voice of the self-assured, impetuous, careless young man ready to take on the world. But, the more measured tones of someone with the wisdom of hard experience, trying to find his way back to his place in the world.  
  
Will this become a habit? Will I go through the years having imaginary conversations with you in my head?  
  
Oh, Sirius, it's not in the battles we fight against the Darkness. It's not in the parts we play in the grand struggle of good versus evil that I will miss you. It will be those small moments where I'll feel your loss the most. Those early morning chats over tea. The late night musings, curled around each other, comforted and complete.  
  
That's when I will miss you the most. I suffer for the waste of good man. I ache for the loss of you, Sirius.  
  
How I wish I could end it now. Slash my wrists, swallow some aconite. But, that would condemn my soul. And, right now the only thing that keeps me functioning is the knowledge that some day, maybe during this war, maybe years from now, I will come to my natural end. My soul will be free. And I will reach across the galaxy to find yours.  
  
END 


End file.
